Family Life: Home Improvements - New Garage Door

We finally did it!


Old garage door

to

New garage door!

Major Improvement!

My folks very generously gave us the money to replace the old 1970's garage door two, maybe three years ago. We were always going to get around to it. We finally did. A wonderful new garage door with an electronic garage door opener which is whisper quiet and smooth.

Now the trim needs to be fixed and painted. And don't you just know it. If the trim needs to be fixed and painted, then the whole house probably needs it. We knew this was going to happen. We knew that as soon as the door got replaced, we would want to paint the house.

Don't you just love owning a home. There is always something to improve, paint, mend or change. Should we go with the same cream with dark brown trim or go for something exotic to upset our neighbors such a mauve or khaki green?


Life is so full of choices!

Question of the Day: Mom, where is it?

Mom, where is it?

Mom is usually the one who knows where everything is, right? The conversation in our house last night as I sat in the living room reading a book.

Father bought James a remote controlled hummer for christmas and they were playing with it. It came with tractor treads and tires. They were trying to change the tires.

Father: I don't know where the tool is to change the tires.
Me: behind the boat on the bookshelf in James room.

Father: Where are the tires?
Me: on the floor in James room.

Father: I only found three.
Me: There's one on the kitchen floor next to the computer.

They putter around with the hummer for quite a while, then decide to disturb my reading time with --- the fart machine.

Father bought a fart machine for Christmas, wrapped and put it under the tree. The day before Christmas, Luna is lying under the tree. James and I are watching TV. Luna lets out a loud fart. After about the 4th time in a hour, I start to get concerned about the loud sounds coming from the cat, who seems to be laying there quite content. Father is laughing his head off. Hmmmm! I pick up the cat and hear another fart, but don't feel anything from the cat. I look at Father. Okay - where is it?

So, last night - Mom, where is the fart remote?

Gee! I have no idea!




My Education: Science and Religion Class

I got an A, I got an A


It pleases me to no end that I got an A in my Science and Religion class. This was one class, I was truly surprised by my grade. It had been a little more difficult that the others and my heart wasn't totally into it. My brain has been into working on my book - "Floating on the surface." My book - I just love that sound of that. I am working on "my book." Silly, yet a simple pleasure.

I have days where it flows and there are days I'm knocking my head against the keyboard trying to figure out how to phrase it. Those days I don't get much done. But, you know what. I am loving it. I truly enjoy writing. My goal is to finish it this year. In the meantime I am reading and learning about the art of being a novelist, researching things for my story and dissecting how well known authors write their books.

In the meantime as life marches on - Lessons are proceeding well. We are gearing back up to a full schedule. Between two weeks off at Thanksgiving and 3 weeks off at Christmas, we have been doing a light schedule. Even father is ready for me to schedule more for them to do on daddy days.

My next class starts on Monday - Film and Literature. The course investigates the relationship between the two and we will be studying Jane Eyre, Street Car Named Desire, Romeo and Juliet and Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. I am looking forward to it.

TTFN

Family Life: Crazy Weather

Wild and Wet Weather

We are in between storms at the moment and all is calm and quiet.

Thursday night, Father and I just happened to watch the news. Something we rarely do these days. The newscaster was talking about gearing up for an emergency and have your flashlights and supplies ready. We look at each other - what? Seems a huge storm was moving in and the word was to batten down the hatches. The forecast called for rain, rain and more rain, plus wind gusts up to 80 mph in some areas. The winds woke me up in the wee hours of Friday morning. It sounded like a freight train outside our window with things on the patio rattling around.

Both James and I were up around 6:30 no longer able to sleep. The rain came in sheets and whipped against the front door, the birch tree kept creaking as it swayed and I watched my neighbors huge pine tree branches bending with the wind. We lost power for all of an hour. We were the fortunate ones - other neighborhoods lost power for several hours.

We didn't have any damage except two huge bags of plant fertilizer exploded on our patio and we have bits of bag and fertilizer all over the patio.

When James and I went to to the grocery store today, we saw many tree branches and fences down. One huge tree lay on it side with a chunk of ground about 7 feet wide around it. Fortunately it had fallen away from the house, but into the power lines. I wish I had my camera with me. James just had to tell everybody in the store that he saw a tree that had fallen over and it was bigger than Godzilla!

The grocery store was packed. According to our bag boy, the power had been knocked out in that area for several hours and they were the only grocery store who had generators for power. The rest of the stores were in the midst of replacing all their spoiled foods.

We are staying safe and dry and cozy in our house for the rest of the weekend.